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The addition of a full quarter's production from the Hunter Valley Operations and Mount Thorley Warkworth assets acquired from Rio Tinto on Sept 1 has lifted Yancoal's equity share of total FY2017 production by 47% to 23.44Mt.Attributable production includes 51% interest in HVO, allowing for Glencore Coal's 49% JV interest.Equity share sales volumes rose 48% to 28,543t, comprising 8,993t metallurgical and 19,550t thermal coal.

A steady-as-she-goes period has seen global miner Rio Tinto achieve guidance on all major products for the year to Dec 2017.A 3% lift in Q4 iron ore shipments to 90Mt enabled Rio to reach 330.1Mt for the year, up 1% from FY2016. Its FY2018 forecast remains 330-340Mt.Mined copper output fell 9% due primarily to the 43-day strike in Q1 at Escondida, meeting its revised guidance at 478.1Mt. It expects to recover to 510,000-610,000t in FY2018.

Indonesia has advanced its campaign to secure local majority control of the Grasberg copper mine with the signing of an agreement by state holding company PT Inalum with national and regional authorities.Inalum, which owns 9.36% of the Papua province mine, is expected to acquire more shares to reach 51% of owner PT Freeport Indonesia.Under the agreement signed Friday, Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati says 10% of Inalum's interest will be shared by Papua province and Mimika regency.

Rio Tinto will launch a consultation with its workers and stakeholders after receiving a binding $US500M offer from UK industrialist Sanjeev Gupta's Liberty House for its Aluminium Dunkerque smelter in northern France.Liberty House also acquired Rio's Lochaber Smelter in Scotland in Dec 2016 for $410M. Rio Tinto Aluminium chief executive Alf Barrios says the sale represents the best option for future development of the business while streamlining its asset portfolio.Rio Tinto expects to complete the sale in the June 2018 qtr.

Rio Tinto has launched a new $US1.925B on-market share buy-back immediately after completing the previous programs of $500M launched in Feb and $1B in Aug 2017.The new program, representing the remainder of the $2.5B buy-back announced in Sept following the sale of Coal & Allied, is targeted to end by Dec 31, 2018.Chief exec J-S Jacques says Rio's combination of world-class assets, strong balance sheet and disciplined capital allocation provide the basis for its cash returns for shareholders.

Iron ore giant Rio Tinto has accelerated the roll-out of automation at its West Australian operations, signing agreements with Caterpillar and Komatsu to retrofit 48 of its existing haul truck fleet to autonomous operations.Rio currently has about 80 autonomous trucks operating in the Pilbara, representing about 20% of its total fleet. The retrofit program will lift it to 30%.The retrofitting of 29 Komatsu haul trucks will allow Rio's Brockman 4 mine to be fully autonomous by mid-2019.

Alliance Miniere Responsable (AMR) has begun production at its Guinean bauxite mine, aiming to produce 6Mtpa-10Mtpa of the aluminium ore, Reuters reports.The mine’s output will all be sold to Societe Miniere de Boke (SMB), a Guinean company whose main shareholders are Singapore’s privately owned Winning International Group and China’s Shandong Weiqao. AMR says that by next year the company should be producing about 8Mt, rising to over 10Mt the following year.

Indonesia plans to acquire Rio Tinto’s stake in the big Grasberg copper mine operated by Freeport-McMoRan, potentially solving a drawn-out problem for all 3 parties, Reuters reports.Under a 1996 J/V, global miner Rio has 40% of Freeport’s Grasberg contract, entitling it to 40% of production above specific levels until 2021 and 40% of all production after 2022. To meet new Indonesian ownership rules, Freeport agreed in Aug 2017 to divest 51% of its Indonesia unit to the govt.